[ExI] What can be said to be "wrong", and what is "Truth"

Mike Dougherty msd001 at gmail.com
Fri Oct 3 00:53:12 UTC 2008


On Thu, Oct 2, 2008 at 6:53 PM, Jef Allbright <jef at jefallbright.net> wrote:
> Argh.  ;-)  Show me a functional (versus operational) model of a
> "superposition."  This is crucial.  You MUST stand somewhere to be a
> "you."  I emphasize that you MUST have a subjective point of view.
> But there is no need or basis for any attempt to define that
> subjective POV in (fundamentally unfounded and unfoundable) objective
> terms.  Don't need it, never did, although it's quite clear from
> cognitive and evolutionary psychology why we as individuals and as a
> culture tend to think and reinforce our thinking in terms of discrete
> selves, absolute truth, fear of the unknown, respect for authority,
> and so on.  But that environment of evolutionary adaptation is rapidly
> slipping behind us and the effective heuristics of our ancestors are
> decreasing in utility.  Let the unfounded ontological assumption go,
> and everything is seen to work as before, but according to a more
> coherent and thus more extensible model.

"Argh" ?  You missed talk like a pirate day (9/19)  I hope i'm not so
missing your point that it causes frustration.

"unfounded ontological assumption" - I'm not sure what I have assumed
(that's clearly a problem).  You said, "you MUST have a subjective
point of view."  I agree.  And so must you.  There is an inherent
parallax for which we need to be aware.  I can abandon my own point of
view and merge my state of awareness completely to yours.  We will
have total agreement and also the same identity (I'm not reinforcing
my discrete self).  You can similarly abandon your viewpoint.  Who
would i/we express ourself(s) to if this were the case?  Perhaps the
mind-merge does not have to be complete to find a point of agreement -
(thinking of Venn diagram where two sets share commonality at their
intersection)    I see the coherent/extensible model of which you
speak following from that intersection to first identify then subsume
the difference.  I don't intend that either set reduce their
membership to increase their proportionate percentage of commonality
(as was happening in the loss of one set/perspective to gain another)
- I propose that each set/perspective increase to include the other.

I don't understand the distinction you make between functional vs
operational models.  I feel it's easier to simply ask rather than
incorrectly suppose your meaning.  I attempt to clarify my use of
'superposition' using the Venn diagram analogy:  The totality of my
subjective viewpoint and the totality of your subjective viewpoint are
both less complete than the union of these sets.  My view is
incomplete.  Your view is incomplete.  Their sum is less incomplete.
I understand one of the points you are trying to make is that given
the sum of every known viewpoint, there is no way to declare
completeness.  (by analogy: there is no way to determine if the union
of all sets maps 1:1 to the Universe)

Please identify similarity/difference from your perspective given the
initial parallax between us.



More information about the extropy-chat mailing list